The Region

The Los Angeles City Council approved a $280,838 settlement in a class-action suit brought by five people who blamed inadequate data stored in a city computer system for what they said were wrongful arrests. In a 4-year-old suit, filed by the Center for Law in the Public Interest, the plaintiffs claimed that they were jailed for crimes they did not commit simply because their names or other identifying features resembled those of wanted suspects. The council, which settled the court case last fall, agreed to pay the money for attorney fees and to implement various safeguards in the city's Automated Wants and Warrants System, which stores about 1.1 million warrants and is used by law enforcement agencies. A similar suit against the county and the Sheriff's Department is pending.